Trip to the Aquarium!

Today, all of Mrs. Shields' Biology I classes visited the New England Aquarium, which currently is running a spectacular special exhibit on jellyfish. The students "scavenged" for facts about marine life and got their hands wet in the "Edge of the Sea" exhibit.

While all of our students displayed true O'Bryant dedication to their field trip assignments, a few also found time to make funny faces at the fish:

Congratulations to Our "Rocket Men"!

Congratulations to Tai Tang, Karuna Um, and Kevin Herman (in absentia) for their impressive showings in the first annual Machine Science citywide rocket-building competition. In the single-launch competition, Tai's rocket placed third and Kevin's placed fourth, against competition from other O'Bryant students, the Madison Park Robotics Club and Burke HS.

Stay tuned as our Gateway "Rocket Men" move on to participate in other engineering/robotics competitions this year, including the prestigious US FIRST Competition! For any other students who are interested in getting involved with robotics, please see Dr. Wu or Dr. Chiamaka Porter in the Boston Community Science Workshop on the first floor of the O'Bryant.

Gateway Biology I Welcomes Dr. Eva Guinan!

This morning, the Gateway Biology I classes welcomed our second visiting researcher from the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Dr. Eva Guinan. Dr. Guinan provided our students with a detailed look inside the complex process of cell transplantation, from the physician's perspective. The students all got a close-up look at the needles used to extract bone marrow, although for safety reasons we could not permit them to handle the needles themselves!

All Gateway students now know the best place on the human body for extracting bone marrow - is the illustration in the photo correct? (The inset photo is taken from a computer simulator for bone marrow extraction from children.)

We hope that Dr. Guinan will return to visit us many times, to share with us other fascinating stories from her career in medicine.

MIT SPLASH courses are up!

As we have announced to all Gateway students and many parents, the online registration for the MIT SPLASH program will open on Halloween evening, October 31, at 8 PM. All students will be allowed to register for ONE course on October 31. Students will be allowed to sign up for an unlimited number of additional courses starting at 8 PM on November 1.

The SPLASH catalog has now been posted online, so you should go check it out and pick out your favorites! Here are just a few examples that are classic MIT fun and games:

--C717: Computer Game Hacking: An Overview
--H491: Build Your Own Headphone Amplifier
--H616: Star Trek: Irritation
--H656: How to Draw Shiny Things
--H676: Mystery Engineering
--H699: Learning to Exhale, Forever
--H711: It Doesn't Just Taste Good! (Chocolate sculptures!)
--H828: Sixty Murderous Minutes of Mafia
--H881: Ramencraft (Ramen noodle sculptures!)

I will give you all a last-minute reminder during your extended-day math classes this week, but it's up to you to go online and register yourselves from Halloween night onwards!

Check Out the O'Bryant Bio Scholars Blog!

The O'Bryant Bio Scholars Club is a new student organization whose membership is drawn mainly from the Gateway program. The co-secretaries of the club, Pierline Durand and Manny Rios Alers, have launched a new blog to report on the activities and accomplishments of the club, which meets weekly on Friday afternoons. Come read about their adventures in medicine and health by clicking here.

Class of 2011 T-Shirts are In!

The O'Bryant Gateway Class of 2011 T-shirts ("First Class Tiger") are here! Thanks to Sindy for polishing the design created by herself, Shelby, Julia, Tai and Tiffany during orientation week!

All students will receive their class T-shirts, free of charge, once every single student has passed the you-know-what: 51 down, only 1 to go...

Dr. Wu's New Office Hours Schedule

All Gateway students are invited to sign up for individual 15-minute appointments with Dr. Wu, to discuss any academic or personal concerns you may have. These appointments will be regularly offered on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, between 2:15 and 3:15 PM. You will be excused from your extended-day class or tutorial to attend your appointment.

Please sign up on the white board outside of Dr. Wu's office. I'm looking forward to getting to know all of you better!

Gateway Biology I welcomes Dr. Pascal Braun!

This morning, the Gateway Biology I classes welcomed our first visiting researcher, Dr. Pascal Braun from the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Dr. Braun provided our students with an engaging introduction to cells, DNA and cancer. During his presentation, Dr. Braun gave all of our students their first opportunity to practice their pipetting skills.

Dr. Braun also hopes to connect our students with future internship opportunities at DFCI, through DFCI's newly established Center of Excellence in Genomic Science.

Thank you, Dr. Braun, for inspiring our students to want to learn more about cancer research!

Introducing the O'Bryant Bio Scholars Club!

The new O'Bryant high school club focusing on biomedical and health careers has been officially named the O'Bryant Bio Scholars Club. Congratulations to Pierline Durand and Manny Rios Alers for being elected as Club Co-Secretaries for the 2007-08 school year.

Stay tuned for a link to a new club blog, to be maintained by Pierline and Manny.

Grade 9 Parent Meeting - Oct. 9

The first Gateway Grade 9 Parent Meeting of the year will be held on Tuesday, October 9 from 6:30 - 8:00 PM in the Science Building Auditorium. This will be the first of three parent meetings to be held this year for parents and guardians of the Class of 2011.

Hello, Gateway Students - Like the Laptops?

This week, Mr. Figueroa is introducing mathematical "gizmos" to the students in the extended-day program, using our classroom set of laptops. Published by ExploreLearning.com, the "gizmos" are online mathematical simulations that are aligned with the BPS curriculum standards.

Students, feel free to comment on this blog! This is where your academic and extracurricular achievements will be recorded, for the world to see. Check out your classmates' photos below...

Biomedical/Health Club Kickoff Meeting 9/21

The kickoff meeting of the new Biomedical/Health Club (placeholder name) for O'Bryant high school students will be held this Friday, September 21, from 2-3 PM in Room 3-317. Come hear about our exciting plans for the year!

Extended-Day Schedule Starts Sept. 17

The extended-day programming for all Gateway students will begin on Monday, September 17. In preparation for this launch, there will be a required afterschool assembly on Friday, September 14, ending at approximately 2:15 PM. During this assembly, we will distribute the students' extended-day schedules and explain the rules and procedures of the extended-day program.

Freshman Orientation Week 2007: We're Off and Running!

From August 27 through August 30, forty-nine members of the O'Bryant Gateway Class of 2011 came together for a four-day program orientation, led by the Grade 9 Gateway staff. This week was packed with activities designed to give the students a road map to success in high school, college and their future careers.

Highlights of the week included:

• Challenging our students to solve an unsolved mathematics problem in graph theory;


• Taking our first (half) practice PSAT exam;


• Learning memorization techniques used by medical and law students;


• Designing our class emblem (First-Class Tigers!);


• A visit from Tony Jack, this year's Obed Finch Slingerland Prize winner from Amherst College;


• Writing fantasy resumes; and


• A closing luncheon hosted by Wentworth Institute of Technology.

During the orientation, all students were challenged to master a memorization task with 100% accuracy, using study aids they had created themselves. Twelve students met this standard of perfection on their first try, while an additional twenty-three students achieved near-perfect scores. On the first re-test administered one day later, twenty-two students attained the 100% passing score, with an additional seven barely missing the mark. We're going to persist with this challenge until every member of the class is over the bar!

Congratulations to all forty-nine students for your hard work this week!

Learning how to work together ....

("Thinking Interdependently")

Studying can be fun!

Tony Jack, Amherst College Class of 2007:

Broad Institute Biology Lectures, July 11 - Aug 1

All Gateway students are encouraged to attend a four-week evening lecture series at the Broad Institute in Cambridge. This year, the "Midsummer Nights' Science" series on Wednesday evenings, 6-7 PM, covers topics including comparative DNA analysis of primates and humans, the human genome, cancer genetics and mitochondrial diseases.

More information can be found online here:
http://www.broad.mit.edu/outreach/midsummer/index.html

The Broad Institute is a research collaboration of MIT, Harvard, and the Whitehead Institute, created to bring the power of genomics to medicine.

NYTimes Special Section on Evolution

All Gateway students are strongly encouraged to read the current New York Times special-edition science section on evolution, published June 26, 2007. Here are links to a few of the lead articles and essays:

From a Few Genes, Life's Myriad Shapes

Darwin Still Rules, but Some Biologists Dream of a Paradigm Shift

In Parasite Survival, Ploys to Get Help from a Host

Summer Assignments - Grade 9

The summer assignments for ninth-grade students entering the Gateway program in Fall 2007 are posted here:
http://obryantgateway.googlepages.com/home

Please contact Dr. Wu immediately if you have any questions or concerns about these assignments. Happy reading and writing!

Grade 9 Parent Meeting

The first parent/guardian group meeting for the rising freshman class (Grade 9) will be this Thursday evening, June 14, starting at 6:30 PM in the Science Building Auditorium.

Introducing the O'Bryant Gateway Class of 2011!

The O'Bryant Gateway to the LMA proudly welcomes its founding Class of 2011:

Learning About Elite College Admissions

On Saturday, May 19, 2007, five students and six parents from the O'Bryant Gateway Class of 2011 participated in a hands-on workshop on highly selective college admissions, hosted by Harvard Medical School's Office for Diversity and Community Partnership. The workshop was led by Ms. Tamy-Fee Meneide, Assistant Director of Admissions at Dartmouth College.

Our students and parents were organized into separate "admissions committees," each of which carefully considered a real-life case study of an applicant to Dartmouth College. The all-Gateway student committee ended up with a very challenging case, in which the real Dartmouth committee expressed divided opinions and the final decision was made by the Dean of Admissions. I'm pleased to report that our student committee made the correct recommendation to admit their student, who turned out to be a fantastic campus leader at Dartmouth!

Many thanks to Ms. Meneide and Dr. Sheila Nutt from the Harvard Medical School Office for Diversity and Community Partnership for inviting us to this excellent workshop!

Welcome!

Welcome to the O'Bryant Gateway to the LMA [Longwood Medical and Academic Area]! This blog will share information about the activities and accomplishments of the students, teachers and partners of the O'Bryant Gateway program.